Fom Vilnius to Warsaw

It's about 450km from Vilnius to Warsaw with no diversions or detours to reduce the tedium. There's not really that much to say about a whole day spent in a bus. Unless you include storks.

We passed through a number of towns and villages which were quite attractive

One of the Polish towns we passed through

One of many rivers in Poland

It became apparent that the rural areas were better off than countries we had previously visited. There are lots of thickly forested areas, and I didn't see any evidence of clear felling as you would in Australia. There were large areas under crops, mainly corn, and both the farms and farm houses were much bigger than previously.

Large farm with cattle as well as crops and extensive outbuildings

Farmhouse with stork's nest

Then there were the storks. They are quite large here and are the national animal emblem. About 25% of Europe's 350 000 storks live in Poland during the summer. In the picture above there is a large stork's nest just above the lower roof. There were many nests along the way, but as the bus didn't stop or slow down, stork nest spotting became an engrossing activity. Once you found one trying to photograph it in time, in detail and in focus was a challenge. Consequently my efforts  are a bit fuzzy. 

Stork's nest with storks on top of a power pole. Also there is a roadside shrine in the bottom right corner.



We finally arrived in Warsaw, population about 3 million, late in the afternoon afer a tedious day